Doctors have withdrawn the ongoing Statewide strike following the assurances given by Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan during talks on Thursday and the decisions taken at a high-level meeting to corroborate this.
The Indian Medical Association (IMA) and the Kerala Government Medical Officers’ Association (KGMOA) said that doctors in the private and public sector will re-join duty on Friday on the strength of the decisions taken at the Chief Minister’s meeting. The KGMOA will, however, continue to boycott VIP duties till the decisions were implemented.
However, postgraduate (PG) medicos and house surgeons have refused to call off their strike immediately and said they will take a decision only after talks with Health Minister Veena George on Friday.
Medicos said that as the main workforce in medical colleges, they were overworked and that they needed a written assurance about a mandatory weekly off. PG medicos also demanded proper and secure accommodation for doctors who are serving in taluk and district hospitals as part of the district residency programme. These provisions which have been written down in the residency manual have never been implemented, they said.
